Ringmaster
by entercreativename
Summary: Who is really in control of this little universe? One woman knows, and she tells her story. HouseWilson. Set immediately after Distractions. Please review, trying new writing style.
1. Chapter 1 My name is

RINGMASTER

EnterCreativeName

Note: Not mine, just fun to play with. Don't sue.

* * *

CHAPTER 1 - MY NAME IS…

I had been at PPTH for two months as a janitor, watching doctors watching nurses watch us. The pay was okay, the work was lousy, but it gave me the chance to just live and take time to find whom I really was. I started on third shift, enjoying the peaceful serenity of the quiet night. Then, through some stroke of luck, one of the day shift people up and quit after filing a harassment suit against one of the doctors, and my hours changed. It made me happy at first, got me a raise, and even got me a little promotion as well. Then, I met someone.

Well, not really met. I was forced into that whirlwind of scandal. I was forced to clean his office. Forced to be a part of his world. I met - him.

Gregory House.

Well, it wasn't really that much of a shock; I've always loved to dramatize my life. I'm an actress, kind of. Well, I wanted to be, and then my parents forced me to go to Princeton University. Med school, eventually. I took the job first as a work-study position as I was already up to my eyeballs in debt with student loans. I should have saved up the money earlier. Sooner. But I couldn't.

And I couldn't keep up with the debt.

Did I say janitor up above? That's, um, just what I tell my parents. It's just a cover story.

About my job. It's an okay gig, really it is. I make good money, meet interesting people. You'd be surprised at whom I've met. Many professors at Princeton University call up looking for someone to "clean" their offices. No, nothing like that! Pervs. I'm just an escort, a woman called upon to distract men who need a distraction. I'm not a whore. I feed the hungry, give water to the thirsty. I keep the company of the lonely and hold the hand of those in pain.

I'm almost like a doctor.

In a way.

Maybe it's the closest I'll come to fulfilling my parents' dreams. Maybe I'm just in denial over the mess I've caused and the shame I've brought upon my family. But I've learned a lot about this one man in particular. I've learned a lot from "cleaning" what's needed to be cleaned.

Besides, I had already been cleaning his office for two months at that point. I did both. I was a janitor at PPTH. Yes, I took the job first as work-study and then continued after I quit college. Then, when I was hit with the loans, I joined the escort service as well. I was good at that, but I needed to keep a "real" job so my parents would never find out.

It all started one day when I got a call…

* * *

"Hello?" I answered to silent the phone that rang angrily on its hook. I was at my lowest point in my life, or so I thought. I had just started with the agency shortly after quitting school, and had just gotten back from a particularly bad evening with a sociology professor. My _former_ professor. It wasn't a pretty night.

"Yes, we have a new client for you."

My body went cold as I heard those words. It had been a month since I started at the agency, and even though I was becoming used to it, it was still something that frightened me. The professor must have called in and complained. I didn't put out enough, I didn't occupy his mind, I didn't distract him. Or something. I was scared.

At our agency we have a rule that the escort has the final say in what our clients do, and I had gotten too involved with my previous, um, client/professor. He had promised me the world, and a full scholarship, if I did more.

I said no.

"The new guy. He's not bad, but a little weird."

Weird? I didn't like the way it sounded.

"What did the last client say?" I had to ask. Was this a demotion? Was I in trouble? I had heard stories shortly after I started of other women who had displeased their clients. They got the weird ones.

"He's not too pleased, but when he told us he knew you from his classes… Anyway, we have a new one for you. He's rich. Disabled though; you could improvise well with his cane. Don't be afraid of him, he's just lonely. He's smart too. With the college or hospital or something."

Great, a cripple. The last thing I needed.

"The address is 221 Baker St. Apartment B. He's expecting you, unless you want to continue with your former professor?"

There was a pause on the phone. I was in trouble with them, I displeased them. Somehow. And now, I'm paying the price. Some weird old guy I bet, just like the other weird old guys I've met in this business. I had to answer or it would only get worse. I told my boss on the other end of the line I would work the gig.

"Don't mess this one up tonight."

I was scared, shaking, crying. I wanted to run. If I displeased them, then I would for sure be in trouble, and I couldn't afford it. I should have told them before about the sociology professor, before this all happened tonight.

But I couldn't. It was too late now, and I had to pay the price for my mistake. I cleaned up my mascara, brushed my black hair, pushed up the twins, and left to go across town.

* * *

_1838  
Princeton Historical Preservation Society has deemed this house one of the Township of Princeton's historical landmarks. This building was built in 1776 and was the home of Derek R. Hill, the first mayor of Princeton New Jersey. …refuge for many travelers along the underground… beacon in the night for those…_

I had found a parking spot, and after spotting the 221 sign, I noticed this plaque on the building. "Great, he likes old things_"_ was my first and only thought about this guy. I didn't want to be there, but I knew I had to. The alternative was far worse.

I knocked on the door, and it opened. In front of me stood a thin, ragged looking man. My eyes took in the sight as I smiled a comforting smile and said, "I'm Paula."

"Hey Paula."

I looked at him some more. Poor guy. He looks like he's been through a lot. The file on him said he was in his mid forties, but he looked so much older. I looked him over again. Scruffy dirt-brown hair thinly covered his head, and a matching two-day old five o'clock shadow outlined his angular jaw. His clothes were frumpy and wrinkled; his cane was the only thing about him that was really sleek. I looked to his eyes and saw a bright icy blue that cut through my soul and shook me. I felt sorry for this man and wanted to keep looking at him, but I couldn't just keep staring. I had to say something, make conversation. "How you doing? You work over at the college? Or are you full-time over at the…"

"I'm looking for a distraction. You don't need to talk to do that, do you?"

He was abrupt. He cut me off. I didn't know if I liked that or not, but he turned me on. After the night I had been having, I wasn't sure if someone so curt would be good for me. And yet, he commanded me into his lair as he overtook me with the spell of his eyes. I was no longer in control of my own body, or actions. All I knew was he was leading me in, those icy blue eyes keeping me in his gaze.

"Brandy's over there. Get yourself one and bring another for me." He lowered himself into his brown leather couch as I got a second glass from his kitchen. As I came back I heard a rattle and saw him opening a small pill bottle that was almost empty. He saw me looking and I blushed. "Want one?"

I shook my head as I handed him the second glass.

"It's just a Vicodin, it'll take the edge off of your fear."

How did he know? I looked at him and he offered me a jagged white pill. Was he actually serious about this? First thing I learned in this business was never to trust anything as it truly was. I had to be careful to keep myself from getting into trouble, or worse, dead.

"Fine, if you don't want it…" he trailed off as he popped the little pill into his mouth and swallowed. I guess it wouldn't have hurt me if he took it.

"Come over here." He motioned me to sit on the couch next to him and I followed. The leather of the couch was warm, he must have been lying there shortly before I arrived. As I settled in more to the couch and took another sip of the brandy, I felt his bony, callused hand take mine and lead it to his shoulders.

"You can start here and work down."

I set down my glass. This man was fast, faster than what I was prepared for tonight. I knelt next to him on the couch, reached around his torso, and unbuttoned the few buttons of his shirt that were still fastened. He smelled like a man. As I knelt closer to his body my chest brushed his back and he tensed.

"Slow down." He was so commanding. I did.

I slid the overshirt off of his shoulders and he told motioned to me to take off mine as well. I did. I folded both shirts neatly, taking in the scent of his deodorant combined with his sweat; there was the slightest hint at another woman's perfume. Maybe she broke up with him today. Maybe she was mad at him. It wasn't my place to ask, but I knew I was needed by him.

"Your shoulders are so tight." I said, quickly remembering his one rule to me: You don't need to talk.

"If I wanted someone to talk to, I would have called my friend!" he stammered at me and I swallowed hard. He looked back into my eyes with his, taking me back in with his soul.

"I'm sorry," I said quietly as I moved closer to him to massage his shoulders. I could sense part of him argued to apologize to me, or maybe I just imagined it. Either way, his shoulders slumped slightly and he eased into the rhythm of my hands working out the knots. I leaned in further and kissed the left side of his neck, still taking in his scent.

"Here, this way." He took my hands, this time gently, and guided them to the hem of his t-shirt. His hands told so much about him. He was careful now, and didn't want to scare me off. He was experienced at this too, he knew what he liked. I slid his t-shirt off over his head and looked back into his eyes. I knew I should be smiling slightly, showing I was comfortable, but I was neither. Sensing this, he turned to me and slipped his arm around my torso and pulled me closer to him; the heat of his body warming in the cold night air. He looked at me again.

"Are you sure you don't want something to take the edge off?" he asked me again as I considered.

"I'm okay."

"Your loss." I saw him take another pill. That was two in thirty minutes, and I had suspected he took some before I had arrived. The last thing I needed was a client to overdose while I was there.

"No more of those while I'm here. Okay?"

He looked at me and was surprised. I knew he told me not to talk; the rule was firmly established early on, but I was concerned. I was no doctor, but I also figured that he shouldn't be taking those pills while drinking; the label on the bottle said so.

"You're smart, not something I really like, but it's your rule. I'll put these away while you're here then." I saw him take the bottle and set it on the table in front of us with his right arm as he held me closer with his left. "Speaking of rules, how far can we go?"

I had to think for a moment. He knew the rules, and he knew I had the final say in anything tonight. I wanted to go as far as he'd let me, and I wanted to be clear about it. In all my time at the agency, I had never gone as far as I had tonight, except with that professor.

"Well how much longer before I need someone else to help me with what's going on _below_ my belt?"

He wanted to go all the way. I wanted to also, but I couldn't. I had to think, and quick. Finally I mustered a quick sentence, "That's fine, just don't tell them that at the agency." With one hand already wrapped around his torso, he took my other hand and brought me to him saying, "Don't talk, just follow my lead."

* * *

When I left his apartment several hours later, he handed me a note he had written while I lay on the couch just watching him write it. He told me not to open it until I had left. I took one step outside his door, waited for him to close it, and I then read the note:

_Come by my office tomorrow. Don't say anything._

_Greg_


	2. Chapter 2 Control

RINGMASTER

EnterCreativeName

Note: Not mine, just fun to play with. Don't sue.

* * *

CHAPTER 2 - CONTROL

As I left his apartment, the events of the evening kept racing through my mind, the scent of his shirt covering my bare shoulders intoxicating me with the essence of his entity. He was so gentle with me; yet, he made sure I knew I was never in control. Yet, who was really in control? As the evening went on, I quickly learned that neither of us really was.

Looking back at what I've already told you, it seems like Greg and I slept together; to be honest, what happened is completely opposite of what you think happened. If we both had the chance, I'm sure we would have though. We couldn't: we were never alone that night.

There were two people there with us that night in memory but not in physicality. The first was his ex-girlfriend, Stacy Warner, the woman who made him a cripple. How cruel could that woman be to him? First, she robs him of his ability to walk normally, and then she steals his heart. Finally, as he is just about ready to get over her, she comes back as a bitter reminder of the past, and then steals his heart again. She kept him playing a vicious cycle over and over to the point where he didn't know what was happening with his life anymore. Or so he told me.

The second was a man, his best friend Jimmy Wilson. This man was always there for Greg, yet, Greg seemed to resent it. He told me that Jimmy was the reason he was alive, yet, Jimmy was also at times the reason he was miserable. He was there to pick up the pieces of Greg after Stacy left the first time. Then, when she came back Jimmy was there to keep him sane. And now, he had fought with Jimmy just today, over Stacy. That's why I was here and not him. When Stacy left Greg, Jimmy was the distraction. When Jimmy got divorced, Greg was the distraction. That's how it worked.

Whenever something very distracting and wonderful was about to happen between us, Greg would stop and say something about Jimmy. We almost did make love. Then Jimmy was mentioned. There were moments I said and did things that suddenly made Greg stop and call me Jimmy.

Getting tired of being called the name of his male best friend, I asked him what he thought of Jimmy and all he could do was smile knowingly. For a man of many words commanding me throughout the evening, it was hard for me to see him suddenly silent. I asked him what he was thinking and he shot me a look of pain through those blue eyes.

Ice.

Cold.

I could not get over his eyes that night. Whenever he would look off into the distance silently, there would be those eyes telling me his every thought. And every thought turned into pain of some sort.

The pain.

He didn't keep to his word on the Vicodin, of course, neither did I. When I realized that he needed the drug for more than just the physical pain of his leg, I allowed him to have it. I guess I was in control for that at least, I wish it could have been for more. He was so pained that he didn't want to feel anything, he even told me this.

How could I get him to open up so much? I asked him and he told me that he didn't know. He had tried therapy once, but gave up after a session when he realized he preferred to feel miserable. At least there was company in it that way. The pain was always there, like a friend that nagged too much, like Jimmy. Then again, there was always the cause of the pain, Stacy. The two were always there.

I started to make him enjoy himself, have fun, and feel good, but it would never last. He told me that Jimmy told him to get a hooker. Two days ago. Then he gave himself a migraine, took LSD, and then a bunch of antidepressants. But, it wasn't my place to judge my clients.

So instead, I made him feel special. I massaged him, listened to him, cooked for him, and did whatever he requested at the time. He in turn sent me away at the end of the evening with a rather pleasant tip and the note which I was still playing with in my hand as I kept circling his block.

I've learned in this business that when a client sends you away against his will it's either because he is about to be found out, such as the moments when his wife is about to come home, or it's because he's about to be attracted to you. As Greg is not married, and neither Jimmy nor Stacy were there, I was soon overcome by the realization of what had happened. I did make him feel special that night.

* * *

"If I could only have someone else see what it's like to be me." 

I turned around from the stove and looked over at him. He had just asked me to make dinner for him, remain silent, play piano for him, and now he's just randomly talking. Weirdo.

"You did hear me, right?"

The way the night was turning out, I didn't like it. He was weird, and I hated being there. He was cruel, mean, irritable, irrational; he was every word I could think of that I didn't like. Then, he'd look at me with those ice blue hard cold eyes and I'd fall back into his spell. At the moment, he was in the other room with his back to me. At the moment, I thought he was weird. Then, I felt a hand on my shoulder.

"You did hear what I said, right?" His hand forcefully turned me around and I was suddenly locked back in his gaze again. I didn't know what to do, think, or act. I suddenly couldn't steady myself so I put my hand back behind me to steady myself.

"Ow!" Pain had seared through my hand and the smell of burnt flesh emaciated from behind where I was now falling forward, away from the heat and the source of pain. I had just burned myself on the burner of the electric stove behind me. Falling forward I found myself suddenly in Greg's arms.

"Are you okay?"

"My hand."

"Let me see."

"It's okay. I just need to…"

"I'm a doctor. Let me see."

I had wanted to run and wrap my hand in something, but he wouldn't let me. Instead, he led me over to the sink where he started the cold water running. He took my hand, looked at it, and then guided it into an immersion of cooling relief.

"You'll be fine, it's just a first degree burn. Nothing serious. Stay here for a moment." He told me as he walked off, turning off the stove on the way out of the kitchen. The water was a relief on the sting of the burn on my hand. I felt so foolish! Every time I saw his eyes I just turned into some idiot. I looked back at my hand and saw little blisters starting to appear where the skin first met the heating element. My eyes welled up with tears of embarrassment and I began to cry.

"I found some Advil in the medicine cabinet. Take a couple."

I took the bottle with the hand that was still okay and he stood behind me, trapping me between him and the sink. Not that I minded. He handed me a glass and motioned for me to fill it with water. I did and took two of the pills. Playtime was over.

"Let me see your hand again." He guided it out of the faucet and looked more closely this time, and under a light. "Second degree. You won't be cooking anymore tonight." I soon felt the cooling relief of cold water on my hand again as he walked off again, leaving me alone. I began to tremble and tried to contain a whimper. I was such a fool! First that professor and now this whole evening here. Could I do nothing right?

"You have a second degree burn. Not fun, but it won't kill you. Well, _shouldn't_ kill you." He turned off the water and led me over to the couch again where he sat me down. On the coffee table lay an open first aid kit. I looked up and mistakenly saw his eyes again.

"Wow, you doctors really are prepared for everything." Idiot!

"Jimmy made me get it. It was that or he'd hire me a nurse to follow me around all the time. Or install closed circuit television in my apartment. Something like that." He held my hand in his, and even though I was watching, I don't remember seeing anything happen.

"How are you feeling?"

I was staring off now across the room. I was so embarrassed by this whole incident. I wanted to run, scream, do anything, but all I could do was sit there staring.

"I asked, how are you feeling? Paula?" I felt a hand jostling my shoulder and he was suddenly shaking me out of my near-trance. I looked at him.

"Cold. Thirsty."

He was lying me down on the couch and he helped me put his shirt on me for extra warmth; my tank top wasn't doing enough of the work. First one hand in one arm and then the other. He then eased me down to lie on the couch and covered me with a blanked that was lying behind me. When I saw him walk back into the kitchen, I became scared. I had lost sight of him! I could tell by the look in his eyes before he left that he was concerned, and normally so was I but I was suddenly feeling, rather good? The pain in my hand had subsided and it just pulsed with a dull throb. All inhibitions left me as I realized I was smiling and blushing.

Greg came back with the glass of water, some spilled on his trousers and his t-shirt as well.

"You spilled the water on you."

"The complication of not using a cane at the moment. How are you feeling now?"

"Drunk."

"Sorry about that. I guess I switched out the Advil with an old bottle of Vicodin awhile back. You'll have to just sleep it off. I brought you some water." He sat on the edge of the couch, his hips touching mine as he guided the cool liquid to my lips. I drank of the cool water, realizing that I was no longer really in control of what I was doing or saying. He held the glass for me as he continued; "I guess this night was nothing like either of us suspected it would be. You did good though, you distracted me. Thank you."

He put the glass next to me and went over to his piano, improvising melodies and harmonies that no longer made sense in my mind, the drug having completely taken over my senses. All was right with the world and I didn't care that I had broken all of my rules, all of the agency's rules, that night.

* * *

Time had abandoned me as I lie on Greg's couch somewhere between sleep and reality listening to the sound the man playing piano. I didn't really feel bad anymore; I didn't feel anything at all for that matter as the painkiller coursing through my veins had taken control of my senses. 

Control.

It was a dangerous thing, control. I was supposed to have it when I was with a client. I didn't. He didn't either. Throughout the night though, it was clear that someone in his life was in control of it, but I couldn't figure out who it was. I sat up. "Greg?"

Silence from the piano was all that replied.

"Who's really in control right now?"

He turned around and looked at me from the piano. "I like you. You've taken time for me tonight, and you haven't given me any looks of pity. You've followed through with almost everything, questioning me when you should have. You've given me the puzzle of your life to solve. You've taken my mind off what was bothering me, and now it seems I've given you the puzzle I've been trying to solve for the last five years of my life."

I saw him stand up and he walked towards a small side table near a chair, picked up a paper and pen, and began to write. "How are you feeling now?"

"Better, more awake."

"Good. Do you want to see someone else for your hand?"

I looked down at it, having completely forgotten about it. "No, it's okay."

He came back to the couch and sat on its edge, placing one hand on my left arm. "If it starts to get worse, you should see someone. Keep it clean. You should probably get these two prescriptions filled in the morning, but who am I to tell you what to do." He put two pieces of paper in the pocket of my jeans and looked back into my eyes.

"Neither of us were in control tonight, were we?" I asked, his gaze no longer keeping me in its trance, but instead raising me to action. I needed to know what exactly had happened, and I needed him to tell me.

Instead, he handed me a note.

"Don't open this until you've left here," he said, guiding me up from the couch while looking my body over, making sure the ill effects of the Vicodin and shock had both worn out. He then led me to the door in silence, handing me my coat and seeing me out.

* * *

That was an hour and a half before this moment. I took a look at the note in my hand, my burned hand, and knew I had to end this while I still had a chance. 

I walked up to the door, knocked, and a short while later, he answered.

"What are you doing here?" he asked roughly, the same roughness that forced me to stay quiet when I first arrived for the evening, the roughness then made me later question this night. I noticed he had never changed out of his clothes; he must have been awake all this time.

I looked into his eyes, I didn't want to do this but I had to. I held his note up between the gaze of our interlocked eyes and handed it back to him. "I can't."

"Keep it. Come to my office tomorrow. I have something _fun_ planned. Oh, and dress, professionally." He closed the door, leaving me standing in silence on his doorstep in the cool night air.


	3. Chapter 3 I have you

RINGMASTER

EnterCreativeName

Note: Not mine, just fun to play with. Don't sue.

* * *

CHAPTER 3 - I have you 

Throbbing pain. The first feeling of a new day, one with Gregory House forcefully in my life, and the first thing I experience is throbbing pain. Great. I knew I should have gone to CVS with those prescriptions before I went home.

Or was it a hangover. Maybe it was instead my alarm blaring from above me as I realized I had just slept for several hours on the floor.

Since when did I have an alarm clock?

Note to self: never do whatever I did last night.

As I sat up I took a look at my surroundings: I was in _a_ bedroom on the floor, but not mine. To my right was a colonial style bed with a wood headboard stained dark; a brown bedspread was haphazardly strewn about it with blue linens underneath and a man twisted in it muttering something about something or someone named Jimmy.

I leaned hard back on my left hand and tried to contain a small scream of pain: I had momentarily forgotten that I had burned it just last night. The man in the bed must have heard me as he breathed deeply.

"You're still here? I thought you would have left by now."

I looked around. I was still at Greg's apartment, wearing his overshirt, _only_ his overshirt, and hugging one of the pillows from his bed.

"Tell me we didn't."

He took his cane and headed for the bathroom. "_We_ didn't. But _you_ were pretty interesting last night."

I tried to stand up and was greeted by more pain. I whimpered.

"I wouldn't try to make that walk of shame if I were you."

"Greg, what happened?" I was furious. And my right knee was now bandaged as well. When did that happen?

Greg continued in the bathroom, leaving me to fend for myself as I stood up and fell back to the floor as my knee gave out. "Greg!" I yelled in anger again as he came hobbling out of the shower wrapped in a towel from the waist down and offered me a hand. "Greg, what happened last night?"

"Let's just say one of us found _some_ control last night. By the way, you're late for work."

I gave him a look of fury as he handed me a woman's suit. "Where'd you get this?"

"Why do you trust me so much? It's not healthy," he asked in response.

"Like _you_ fit the definition of health."

Why _did_ I trust him? I took the suit and looked at it. It was not mine. When I asked him to whom the clothing belonged to he said it didn't matter, she would never return to claim it. I knew instantly that this was Stacy's suit and was bitterly reminded of the previous night. I was in a moment of desperation, and apparently so was Greg. I needed the work, and he needed someone to distract him. We somehow bonded in some form of friendship over that.

"We didn't sleep together, if that's what you're angry about. Matter of fact, you hit on me after you came back, but I told you to go to sleep. And you did."

"How did I end up in your bedroom?"

"Compromise. Get dressed, we have to get to work."

"I want to shower."

"Picky. You already did." I looked over and saw the still-damp towel that was still near my pillow from the night before and instantly assumed that it was mine.

He then left me alone in his bedroom with his ex-girlfriend's clothing and _without_ any other option.

"Greg, where are my other clothes?"

"Covered in blood."

Part of me, most of me, said that I was in over my head while the other part asked just what I had left in my life anyway that it really mattered. And the truth was, all I had now was that escort gig. My job on the janitorial staff at PPTH pretty much ended the second I ended up on the doorstep of a doctor from that hospital.

As I finished getting dressed I looked at the clock and saw it was 9:47 am. I was almost four hours late for the janitorial job. That clinched my fate of getting fired. I was about to yell at Greg for this entire mess when I heard him on the phone in the other room with Dr. Cuddy, the head of the hospital, confirming that he had money in his budget to hire a secretary for his department.

Secretary?

He came back into the bedroom and asked if I was ready to go. I was. I wanted out of that apartment. My parents were so right about the mess my life had become.

* * *

I arrived at the hospital later that morning to a fresh-faced Gregory House greeting me in his office by yelling at me for being late. 

"And whose fault was that?" I asked as three doctors only a few years older than me watched in on our little argument from the next room.

"Shh. Not here." Greg whispered to me, disguising the gesture as a sneeze and then limping to his desk, sitting in an exaggerated motion that made the three doctors listening in suddenly jump back to the task they had previously been assigned to. "Now, I know that you were on the janitorial staff here. No secrets there, you were about to be fired anyway. But, consider the next few days and extra tips the answer to any of your questions from last night. On one condition: you will be my secretary until you figure out the puzzle."

Made sense. The agency had forewarned me about this guy and puzzles. It was cute while I had the Vicodin in my system, which for some odd reason he prescribed to me last night for my burned hand. A little overkill I thought. I looked at my hand again and felt like a young child trying to show off to her parents just how mature she actually was. Who was I kidding? I shouldn't have ever gone over to his apartment last night. I should have quit my job at the agency.

But then what would I have?

I'd have a part-time, minimum wage janitorial job at a hospital, no education, no boyfriend, and a very large debt from three and a half years in college. I could never afford that. Plus, as my apartment was part of what the agency gave me for employment, I'd lose that too and be homeless.

I should have listened to my parents all these years.

Greg continued to tell me the rules for when we were at the hospital. First, act like nothing had ever happened in the last twenty-four hours. Second, refer to him as _Doctor_ House and his associates by their proper names, not anything we made up the previous night. Third, make sure Cuddy never finds out where he is or what he is doing; distract her at all costs. Finally, don't question the amount that will be on my paycheck.

That really didn't make sense.

He stood up and walked over to the room where the three doctors were sitting, pretending to be busy at their work but we all knew what they were really doing. He motioned for me to follow, and I did, regretting these last several days that led up to this one.

"Greetings my minions!" They all glared at Greg, wondering what he was up to now. "We have a new plaything. Her name is Paula. You may share when I'm not busy using her. She's my escort, as the new-fangled lingo you kids like to use go."

I wanted to throw up.

If it wasn't for the fact that I had no alternative to the job at the agency, which I was also told I needed to keep while I played secretary, I would have been out of that office in a heartbeat.

"Wait, _you_ have a secretary?" The African American doctor asked House.

"I do as of the moment I promised Cuddy all of our reports would be in."

I was seriously screwed.

House continued with the meeting, rather painlessly, and finally introduced me to his staff. The first was a young Australian doctor, Robert Chase. He had been there for two and a half years. The second doctor that joined his team was a woman named Allison Cameron. The third and final doctor was named Eric Foreman, the African American who spoke earlier. These were three of the several people at the hospital I'd be observing over the next few days.

* * *

"Is House around?" I looked up at the desk and saw Dr. Cuddy standing in front of me. "Oh, it's you. Look, just don't do anything stupid and just maybe you'll still have that janitorial job when House fires you for gross negligence." 

"Dr. Cuddy, oh, what are you doing here? I didn't expect you to come by." I had to play with this one.

"Look, I know you've been told to hide House from me for however long you are at this job, but just remember that I authorized him to hire you and that I still sign your paychecks. Or, did he work out a little deal on the side?"

She was on to me, but then again, anyone who would have to look after Greg would be. I continued to play with her. "Oh, no deal Dr. Cuddy. He just, enjoyed my, cleaning skills." All that time in the principal's office in high school actually did pay off.

I saw Cuddy look around the office and rather than call my obvious lie she gave me a warning, "Here's my pager number. The second House ever leaves this office; you page me and tell me where he's going. That's the only reason I let him hire you. Got it?"

"Oh yes Dr. Cuddy." I took the sheet of paper from her and made it look as if I was busy memorizing it. I had no intention of ratting Greg out to her, not with what he was paying me.

"By the way, Stacy will probably want her suit back before she leaves town."

That's what happened and why I smelled a woman's scent on Greg's shirt the night before. Dr. Cuddy turned around and cheerfully bounced out of the office. I looked over to a hallway intersection and saw Greg watching our interaction, making sure she was in the elevator before he came back.

"What did she give you?"

"Her pager number. Apparently, we're both on double-secret probation."

"She's into that you know; fraternity fantasies have always turned her on. It's the toga. By the way, new patient, need you to distract Cuddy while the kids try to get MRI time. Page her and tell her that I'm taking the cafeteria hostage."

"Can do boss." This was fun, much better than cleaning hospital toilets. "Where are you _actually_ going?"

"Balcony. General Hospital's on in five minutes. Learn anything yet?"

I had to think. I had known Dr. Cuddy for a while so it was somewhat easier starting with her. Who was she? I knew she ran the hospital and was the Dean of Medicine. While I had never interacted with her at first, I had been in a few meetings that determined my fate. Even though I had been promoted to day shift shortly after being hired, there was still the problem of my being hung over in the morning that often made me late for work.

So, what had I learned? Greg is above Cuddy here, but then again, I had known that since the first day I started working here on the janitorial job. I don't know how many times the service staff somehow got conned into covering for him, and yet Cuddy always knew. She let him get away with a lot, but I knew that the answer of "Cuddy" wasn't right.

"Hurry up, don't want to miss my soap."

"I can't say yet seeing I've only been here three hours."

"Smart answer. Keep watching." With that, Greg went out onto the balcony and took out his portable TV and I went back to my paperwork confident that I'd soon find out more about this crazy circus of a hospital.


End file.
